FIRA SYAFIQAH BINTI SAIFUL RAHIM SIO160005

SIO3002: RESEARCH & COMMERCIALIZATION

FIVE STRATEGIES FOR SUCCESSFUL COMMERCIALIZATION IN BIOTECH

PROF CHANDRAN
Commercialization can be defined as the process or cycle of introducing a new product
or production method into the market. There are 3 key aspects of key commercialization:
ideation stage, business process stage and engage stage. Ideation stage involves the search for
many ideas to obtain one or two products or business can be sustained for long-term. Business
process stage is a stage-wise process and each stage has its own key goals and milestones.
Engage stage is essential to key stakeholders early including customers.
The Commercialization Action Plan involves 5 elements. First, develop the marketing
mix which includes marketing aspects which all inquire to obtain the same target to create
awareness and customer loyalty. Secondly, address the 7 Key P’s: Product, Place, Price,
Promotion, People, Process and Physical Environment. Thirdly, design the product pre-launch
planning and preparation. Next, budgeting and the last one is to manage the product launch and
post-launch management.
There are five strategies for successful commercialization in biotechnology. First of all,
create an entrepreneurial culture to ensure efficient management of limited expertise,
resources and funding that are needed for successful commercialize opportunities. In this case,
small to medium biotechnology companies need to start defining the products and services that
will focus on a market need rather than addressing the technology itself. Hence, companies that
are able to quickly develop the products and services will have greater opportunity to achieve
success.
Second strategy is undertaking early stage market research in which biotechnology
companies need to carry out market research early to identify specific market needs to drive
their product and service development strategy. There is a need for firms to ensure that there is
demand for the type of product and services by identifying a differentiated market niche. Third
strategy is embedding innovation across the organization. A culture of innovation should be
embedded in an organization where the innovation should include process innovation,
organizational innovation, business model innovation and marketing innovation as well as
product and service innovation.
Fourth strategy is establishing strong alliances and networks. One of the obstacles in
order to convert biotechnology opportunities into tangible outcomes is ‘commercialization
chasm’ which divides the early stage ‘proof of concept’ from the latter stage translation of the
technology to a product or service. Hence, this chasm should be overcomed by adopting an
open innovation mindset that assists networking and collaboration to access expertise, many
channels to market as well as novel funding options. Last but not least is to identify novel
funding and resources. This strategy involves the small biotechnology firm establishing a
collaborative strategic alliance with another larger, more established organization or institution
to co-develop the technology and this technology is ‘incubated’ in other organization where
expertise, resources and funding can be combined to enhance the development of product or
service.
From this seminar, I agree that it is important to know the definition of
commercialization as well as some strategies need to be carried out for successful
commercialization so that we can successfully market the product or service to the consumers
or customers. Entrepreneurial culture is essential for better management of limited input and
manpower to market the products. Other than that, it is important to address demand in the
market so that there will be no wastage and we can create profit from doing the research itself.
If there is demand, we can directly do research, some strategies to develop the product and
finally commercialize the product or services without any worries because there is demand in
the market. Innovation is important nowadays because people are looking for something novel
and unique which makes the product or service outstanding. Being innovative can help firm to
market products easily as it has an added-value element that can attract consumers to buy or
use the service. Funding and resources are also of utmost importance so that we can carry out
the research as well as getting the material needed to develop the products with ease.

PROMOTING A CULTURE OF SAFETY IN RESEARCH

DR TAN YEE SHIN
It is important for researchers to know that a culture of safety should be embedded in
the research process so that the research that is carried out will give benefits but not to cause
harm to the society as well as the environment. There are some risks that are related with
research and need to be taken into account including risk to researcher, risk to general public
and risk to the environment. Risks can be defined as the probability of harm from physical,
physiological, social, legal or economic that occur due to involvement in a research study.
Hence, researchers should ensure that the research carried out is harmless by conducting some
tests such as harm test and faith test. Some elements that need to be ensured to be harmless are
the publishing technique, threat to the national security and research data.
In this seminar, we were given two case studies. The first one was about face-to-face
interview with identified ex-prisoners who have been released from the prison for more than 6
months and the video as well as the identity of the participants will be kept confidential. We
were asked to identify the risks to the researchers, interviewee, university, country and others,
that were related to this project. From this situation, the researchers may get false information
from the interviewee. This will cause the data obtained for the research to not be true to a
certain extent. Hence, the research can be said to be unsuccessful.
From the interviewee perspective, the interviewee may get traumatized after being
asked questions about their past even though the data is used for research purpose only. The
data of the interviewee may get leaked to the public and this can cause the interviewee to be
less confident to continue his or her normal life. From the university perspective, academic
dishonesty is questionable. The university reputation can be affected due to dishonesty in
giving data research to the public. In the country, the ex-prisoners may commit the same crime
as he or she get traumatized and wants to do the crime again, and this can cause harm to the
society in the country. The public will get false information from the research data and this will
cause confusion for further study to be carried out. Thus, from this one project itself, we know
that many risks can be obtained, and it is important to ensure that the research is done with
good strategy without causing harm to any parties.
The next case study was about video clip leaking caused by Dr Z and his team where
an uncensored video clip with one of the rape victims went viral on the social media while the
study is still on-going. There are five parties involved to solve the issue: university top
management, media, Dr Z, master student and ethical or investigatory committee. As the
university top management, it is best for them to question Dr Z about the training that should
be given to the master student as well as his ignorance to report about the issue to the university
top management. The university may want to take care of the university’s reputation but it is
far more important to solve the issue as soon as possible even though the case will affect the
reputation of the university. If Dr Z is guilty, they should fire Dr Z as he is being irresponsible
for being a dishonest researcher especially when his student get traumatized after the interview
session.
Dr Z should explain on why he did not give training to the master students. Although
they are master students, they still need some training on how to conduct research without
causing harm to any parties. It is important for Dr Z to remind his students to take care of the
research data obtained. The master student on the other hand, should realize his responsibility
to take care of the data obtained as well as avoiding to ask questions that can hurt the
interviewee’s feeling. Hence, as a student, he should know how to handle the interview session
properly. The media, should ban the video from getting more viral to the public. In this case,
the media should not be the one who wants to get the fame. Instead, they should take care of
the sensitivity of the ex-prisoner by removing the clip from the media. Last but not least, ethical
or investigatory committee should always be there to investigate who is really guilty in this
situation. We can say that Dr Z and the master students are guilty, hence some measures need
to be taken to them so that the same mistake will not occur in the future.
From this seminar, I agree that safety in research is important without causing harm to
any parties. Therefore, we have to identify the risks associated with our research and conduct
test such as faith and harm test to further identify the risks that may be arisen from the research.
In research, development and commercialization, ethics and safety are important so that
consumers will get the true information about the product or service offered. Labelling on the
product packaging should be ensured to be labelled properly with correct amount of ingredients
as well as the company name to manufacture the products. Once consumers get false
information, it is hard to gain trust from the consumers again and of course, researchers need
to do research again on how to market the products to the consumers. Product packaging should
be always in good condition so that customers will do not have doubt to buy and use the same
products again. However, it is also important for the researchers and manpower to ensure the
research process will not cause harm to themselves by promoting culture of safety in research.